WhatRoughBeast

Releasing Ash, Jason starts rummaging through the cabinets until he finds a large stack of plates. Laying out a few on the counter, he then proceeds to conjure up a tub of ice cream from the depths of the refrigerator (he shrugs an apology to no one in particular, for the lack of any flavors other than vanilla), and starts vigorously spooning large dollops onto the plates.

"Oooh me me, I want a slice too!"

Jason puts one arm over Ash's shoulder, "My friend, I assure you, you'll be wanting some of that ice cream. Ice cream is concrete proof that God exists and wants us to be happy."

Jason looks at Ash, then at Kegen, then Micaela, gaping a little and trying hard to form a question, "Did you... did he just... did you just poke your eye? You're joking... he's joking, right?"

Giving up, he scratches his head, then shrugs. "Maybe we should all just have our pie and go to bed. It's kinda late, and all this baking is exhausting work. The whole eye's cream thing, that exceeded my weirdness quota for today. Not to mention, I'm kinda curious about what the show will have for us tomorrow."

Jason's face is serenely straight as he launchs into an explanation, "Well, you see, 'midget' is a term usually used as a gesture of respect for someone who happens to be shorter than yourself. It's very useful for defusing tension. For instance, you're in a bar, and this biker-guy is looking to start a fight. Say, you're 6 feet tall, and he's like... 5'6. You call out to him 'We mean no disrespect, Mister Midget Person.' Trust me, he'll sense how polite you're being, and nobody will get hurt."

Jason looks over at Arden, wrapped up in what looked like sackcloth and rapidly approaching the kitchen. He turns to Ash, "Tell you what. I'll let you have all the credit for coming up with referring to him as 'midget-guy' in exchange for your slice of pie."

((OOC: Sorry about not posting earlier, guys. Was busy saving the world, and whatnot.))

"That's my question too. When can we eat it?" Jason asked, sitting rather comfortably on the kitchen counter and drumming his feet against it.

"Let's leave a couple of slices for the midget guy and Mister Zoolander, shall we?"

[ QUOTE ]
"Yes, now that you mention it, I could probably use some help. Could you check the refrigerator? There should be milk and eggs in there, and we'll need both."

[/ QUOTE ]

Jason gives one last wistful look at the obliviously snoring Arden, then reluctantly goes to the kitchen and starts working on the pie. Every once in a while, some fresh idea for a prank would make his eyes sparkle, but stern looks from Micaela manage to make him reconsider. His rumbling stomach also helped encourage him to let the pie reach completion.

Of course, kneading dough, being the endlessly fascinating activity it is (and he tells Micaela as much. Repeatedly), his thoughts wander a little, to the Terrible Trio who've retired to their rooms.

I wonder if they've really gone to sleep... I wonder if the girls brought their pee-jays. Maybe they forgot, and they have to sleep nekky... Hmm.. probably not. What am I thinking. But I wonder if they're already asleep. I hope to God they aren't the type to have the really big nightmares... my new housemates might freak out if I had to battle dream-constructs in the living room. Oh God please don't let it be dragons, I'm still sore from that last time.

Good thing all this noise has been keeping the short guy in the armchair from reaching dream-sleep. If he comes up with a Lord of the Rings balrog, I'm not dealing with it. Gandalf got messed up fighting those things, I'm not gonna even try.

mmm... this icing is tasty.. uh oh, I think metal-girl saw me....


Jason glances guiltily around, sheepishly licking icing off his fingers.

Very reluctantly, Jason puts down on the table the two oranges he had been ready to launch. He looks up at Micaela,

"Do you want any help with that pie? If not, I'll be.. uh.. hanging out right here, playing decorate-the-dwarf."

Jason looks up from his delicious object of lust just in time to get clocked on the forehead by a flying fruit. Rubbing his head and glaring at Ash, he picks up two of the unpeeled clementines and holds them behind his back with exaggerated stealth, very casually remarking, "Let's not start a food-fight. After all, we -are- all mature adults here."

By this time, Jason has managed to sidle up near to where Ash is and gotten his hands on a few clementines. For some reason lacking the manual dexterity to peel them with any degree of grace, he manages to assault various members of the group with orange bits and sticky juice.

Finally managing to get a big piece into his mouth, he remarks, "I vote for sitting around and staring at each other. But that's just me."

He glances at a piece of fruit Ash had peeled perfectly and placed on the table, eyes shining with lust.

Jason stared at Varon, Samantha and Crystal with an expression of melodramatic awe, "So, you guys saved Statesman using the Double Pretty Pose Attack and the Pose of Victory? Does that mean... does that mean you guys have also mastered ... Blue Steel?"

He turns to Etherburn, "Remind me to put you in touch with my brother Adam. The one who's your biggest fan. I think he might be able to offer some answers about your situation." He turns back to face the group.

"Well, we've had one somewhat sad story and one... impressive story. Mine's not half as exciting really. No big secret about my powers either. I was born a human child (like most of you), but with a Fey spirit. A changeling, we used to be called. I grew up in a pretty whacky family though. My parents are normal enough, but my older brother is some super-genius-scientist type person, and my younger brother's a weather-manipulating mutant. My childhood, as I recall, involves endless episodes of dodging the temporal-warping rays from innocuous Lego constructs and the lightning bolts from rogue storms. Standard Malcolm in the Middle stuff, I suppose. "

"Nothing traumatic happened that made me become a superhero. No death of a parent, murder of a loved one, that kind of thing. But, I mean, given superpowers, which kid wouldn't want to be one, right? So I did. Become a costumed crimefighter, I mean. Did my part in the Rikti wars, but somehow managed to miss every major engagement by being in the wrong place at the wrong times... Now, I'm a squad leader for Paragon Heroes Incorporated, which makes me enough to get by."

"Oh... and if any of you even think the word 'fairy', I'll beat you with a stick. Many sticks, even."

"Why, yes. And you must be..." Jason pauses for a fraction of a second, and his eyes widen as if he had just learnt something surprising, "... You're Etherburn? It's a pleasure to finally meet you! You have no idea, my brother Adam will be flipping out right now that I'm talking to you in person. He's a big fan of yours. Speaking of which, would you excuse me for a moment?"

Jason leaps off the couch where he'd been sitting, looks around wildly for one of the omnipresent cameras, positions himself in front of one, and clears his throat.

"Hey Adam. Guess who's in the Big Brother house with me. Oh ... I guess you already know, if you've been watching. But yeah, it's Etherburn! That future chick. Tell you what, I'll put in a good word for you, but that means you're never gonna bring up that twenty-six bucks I owe you. Ever again. Right.. uh.. I guess that's it. Uh.. yeah."

He walks back to the couch and slumps bonelessly into it. Gesturing vaguely in the direction of the camera he was just talking to, he explained to a bemused Etherburn,

"Family business."

Jason drops off his bag of personal stuff next to the couch in the living room, takes a moment to stretch and look around, then walks to rejoin the others, all gathered around the entryway...

... just in time to be dazzled by "the Trinity" and their amazing welcome-to-disneyland entrance. Reaching out, he shakes the hands extended in friendship, flashing his best smile at Crystal and Samantha. Mouthing a You lucky [censored] to Varon, he disengages from that group to take a better look around at the others.

Hmm. That redhead with the nice body is really cute. But she's talking to that other dude. I wonder if they know each other. He looks like.. he could be kinda cool. Or boring. Or competition. Wow look at the size of that TV! I wonder if these people are any good at Halo. Dammit, we can't play video games anyway, can we? Nice, is that couch real leather? Oh wait... must focus on other people in the house. That crazy albino girl with the crazytalktoofast-ness. A little weird, but looks like fun. And Varon and that bunch, .... this'll be awesome.

Wasn't there a dwarf somewhere? Jason looks around a little nervously.

There was a great thrumming, a deep vibratory resonance that started and begun to swell. At the same time, the skies darkened, a deepening shadow falling across the assembled crowd. As the gloom and the sound intensified, a few of the curious looker-ons started to panic, and there were scattered screams and clattering noises and muttered curses and some tried to run. The twilight became darkest night, the music reached a crescendo, there was a fluttering of wings, and out of that howling madness, a voice:

"Ta dah."

As the sunlight returns, a young man, dressed in a t-shirt (featuring The Falumpin Oranges, The Worst Band Ever) and jeans, stands amidst the gaping journalists and amused heroes, grinning from ear to ear. As his massive shadow-wings fade and burn away in the returning light, Jason Galt hefts a bag over his shoulder, flashes a million-watt smile at the crowd and his fellow contestants (presumably, given the odd costumes and funny dress sense, and OH DEAR GOD a dwarf?), then saunters off towards the house.

It is late, and the streets quiet, when a shadowy figure slinks furtively into the booth. Dressed in a dark coat, with a baseball cap pulled down over his eyes, he pauses for a moment, listening intently to make sure there is no one close by.

Finally relaxing, he takes off his cap to reveal tousled dark hair, which he runs his hands through a few times in a futile attempt to tame. Giving up, he manipulates the machine, then settles back in the chair for the questions.

1) Please state your name and security level.
Uh.. name's Jason. Galt. Security level 50, though that's apparently under review because of that incident last week with the temporary disappearance of the Galaxy Girl statue. Which they think had to do with me. But whatever. It should still be 50 when this show runs. Maybe 49. Let's just say 49.

2) Can you please tell us about your origin and powers?
Origin? I could get into the details, but I didn't realize this was -that- kind of show. I mean, I come from where most babies come from, that good enough?
And my powers... well, I can hold my breath really well. And tie a cherry stem into a knot with my tongue. And I can read, and write, and sometimes I even do laundry. Other than that, some minor dreamstuff manipulation, nothing special.

3) Please tell us about any interests or hobbies you might have.
I like kicking butt for justice, but I'm a hero, so you probably already know that. I like.. regular stuff, I guess. Drinking, partying, hanging out with friends. And Air Soccer. Which is this really cool game we came up with. It's like... well, soccer, but way in the air. So it's totally three-dimensional and stuff, and obviously, only for people who fly. But ... it's really cool.

4) How would you describe yourself?
Awesome comes to mind, but understatement really isn't my thing. I mean, seriously, what kind of question is this? Okay, I'm would describe myself as .... a kumquat.

5) Do you think you are easy to get along with?
It really depends on who's trying. I know a bunch of Freakshow dudes, used to talk to them when they were working downtown at Kroger's, now they scream bloody murder everytime they see me. On the other hand of the spectrum, I know my gramma thinks I'm great.

6) Please tell us a little about one of your recent missions?
Hmm.. oh! This really funny thing did happen recently. One of my collegues got a lead about yet another one of those front-companies the Prussian Prince of Automatons likes to set up. So, since I'd just beat Halo2 for the billionth time, I thought it'll be fun to go check this place out with him. I mean, I wasn't expecting it to be a real lead. Turns out, place was full of soldiers, much craziness was had. Now, it's all routine butt-kicking. Then, we come across a storage area, with cryogenic freezing units. I kinda knew what to expect, because I've seen similar installations in other Nemesis bases. But apparently, my friend didn't. He opens it, sees a bunch of disembodied grey matter, and passes out. My friend, the tanker, capable to standing unyielding before hordes of ninjas and aliens and bears, fainting from the sight of a fridge full of brains.
So yeah, I just thought that was hilarious.

7) Why do you wish to appear on Big Brother: Heroes?
Money, fame, meeting girls, because my agent said it'll be good publicity, because Ben dared me to, how many more becauses could you need?

8) What do you think you will be able to bring to the Big Brother house?
Well, the female demographic -is- rather significant, and assuming more people watching the show is a good thing... I'm your man.
In addition, I think I'm more amusing that I am. Which makes for good TV too, no?

9) What would you do if you win Big Brother Heroes?
After the initial few years of using my TV celeb status to hook up with every possible chick in this hemisphere? Go back to saving the world and foiling evil, I suppose. I mean, what else can a man do?


As the questions stop, Jason looks vaguely disappointed that he did not get to talk more about himself. Sliding his hat back on, he entertains himself by spinning around in the chair for about five minutes, before leaving.




10) ((OOC question: How regularly can/do you post?))
Barring the apocalypse, probably at least once a day. Except weekends, maybe, sometimes. But once every two days at the very least.

11) ((OOC question: Do you wish to be picked?))
Yep. Been looking for an open RP thread to join, this one looks like good fun.

((ooc: sorry guys, real life stuff meant I didn't have time to read or post till now. My apologies. And Averick, who's Jack? Do you mean me, and misremembered the name? I'll assume so hehe.))

For a moment, the air became incredibly still, as if poised on the edge of some massive change. From all around, there was the muted, distant twang of harpoon fire and the crazed bubbling roar of some underwater beast. Jason was suddenly there in the room, one hand still poised to hurl a shadowy dagger he was holding. He was dripping wet, his left shoulder was covered with gore, and he smelt of seaweed and fish guts. Then the sounds faded away, and the atmosphere returned to normal.

Lowering his weapon, Jason looked around, the shock apparent on his face as he took in the twin Melissas, the bizzarre new arrivals, and the warped reality parameters. He rushed into an apology, "I'm really sorry guys, one of my alt world buddies really needed my help with this devouring earth beastie. Had to go save his behind, so I left a possibility simulacrum in the original universe with you guys, but the situation was beyond his limited programming. I figured you didn't really need me for a while...but... what on earth happened? How did you guys end up in this world?"

Jason stood, extending his hands, palms cupped to describe a small spherical area in front of him. Muttering as he ran through a few trial equations, he seemed to finally find one he was happy with. He held his breath and

a black rod was there before him, defying gravity as it rested gently on nothing right there in the air. Slightly over a feet in length, it nevertheless managed to convey the impression of incredible weight and density, of the immovability of mountains.

Jason let out the breath he had been holding. Looking very relieved that it worked, he grinned as he glanced around the room, hoping for an appreciative audience. Looking slightly depressed at the lack of applause or cheering crowds or swooning women, he turned back to the rod, appearing deep in thought for a moment.

The room spun, dimensions whirling in stately dance around the fulcrum that was the rod. Moments stretched like taffy, losing meaning in the wheeling majesty of worlds. Infinite glittering universes revealed themselves, reflected and refracted off each other and spawning new timelines, splitting and converging in fractal madness. Through this all, the nigh-dark rod held steady, and quickly, the dizzying array of dimensions collapsed into one. The room appeared as it had before, except shaded with a pale silver blue light.

Gesturing theatrically, Jason bowed, "We are now officially no longer in Kansas, ladies and gentlemen. As George Washington said in Bill and Ted's most excellent adventures, party on, dudes!"

"Who's the Wraith? Cool name, but I have no idea who you guys are talking about. Some new kid in town?"

Jason, by this time, had found himself a nice comfortable spot on the floor, and now slouched bonelessly against the wall, fingers laced behind his head.

"Hey you guys, wanna try what we just did again? I promise, it won't hurt as much this time."

Jason shifted uncomfortably, "That lady? Uh... I don't know her. Not really, we just kinda had a thing back then. Sorta. Where is she, anyway?"

Jason smiled stupidly at the lady who had just appeared and now occupied every thinking cell of his body, brain or otherwise. Unconsciously running his fingers through his hair to get it back in some semblance of order, he continued to gaze dreamily at the lady as she threw up and reinforced shields of ice in between them and the rampaging creature.

It was almost a full minute before his happy fantasies were interrupted by a focused lance of dark energy from the creature that bore a smoking hole through the shields and scorched the ground not two inches from Jason's left foot. He shook his head as if to clear it, and blinked.

The redhead was crouched in front of him again, lips almost touching his. Tick-Tok was halfway through his leap, and the creature was just turning to cut down the heroic robot.

Jason sighed regretfully, winked at the surprised ice lady, then blinked again.

Mystic Inferno was just rising off the ground, dark energy dripping from his fingers, and the light of possession in his eyes. Corvus was just diving for cover. The necromojo lady was just shedding her clothes. There was a cat in the room.

*blink*

The sphere had just broken. The horse-dragonfly creature was just rising from the remains, and a beam of darkness was halfway to Mystic Inferno.

*blink*

Mystic Inferno stood near the device, fingers sketching the first runes of the ritual. The spheres all remained innocently whole, as was the rest of the room. The other participants were where they were before, with the buxom redhead nowhere to be seen.

Jason collapsed, sitting back down hard on the ground, face pale with exertion. "That was fun," he muttered to noone in particular, then yelled out, weakly, "Someone stop M.I., and tell him what's going on."

"Craaaaap." Jason muttered from behind a console where he had dived when the creature appeared. "They probably assume I'd already set up the possible world thing and will be ready to pull them out of this nightmare whenever things go bad they probably should have told me that they expected me to have done it because it's not yet ready and I didn't know they were already gonna...crap."

Jason blinked.

There was a burst of silent thunder, a concussive wave of not-quite-light. Corvus was suddently back behind the original console, good as new, the scratch in her arm nothing but a bad memory. The fire licking the walls vanished, leaving behind no trace of soot. A knife popped back up on the table. Mystic Inferno was once again lying dead on the ground with a hole through his chest.

Jason sneaked a quick look around in time to see Mystic Inferno's corpse start to stir again, then ducked back behind the console, leaning back against it and panting.

"Okay, not quite far enough. We need a different World from further back along the timeline. Gimme a few moments, guys."

Jason smiled a greeting to Melissa, then turned to the others. "There, there's the necromusician person. I'm sure she'll be a little more useful than I am dealing with the voices and faces and such. And M.I., that's a great idea. I've been meaning to try out this new Axiom I've been working on, and this is a perfect opportunity. It should be strong enough to hold most of the universe together while we mess around with this thing in our own little bubble. Just give the word."

He moved towards the food-laden table and started heaping more stuff onto his now-empty plate.

Holding aloft a plate piled high with every kind of available food, Jason edged past Corvus and walked towards the spot in question. Once there, he stood still for a moment, then appeared lost in thought, absently chewing on a chunk of beef.

"You know," he said, gesturing at Mystic Inferno with his fork, a piece of meat still impaled on it, "in many of the nearlby possible worlds, you fainted from shock upon hearing that thing speak. In a few, you turned into a weird looking dinosaur thing. In a disconcerting number of them, you burst into flames. Whatever that means. Good thing the you in this world is made of sterner stuff, huh."

"Anyway, I was thinking we could try a few things. Some of the forks on these paths seem promising... no pun intended, of course." Jason speared a piece of potato with his trusty silverware. "If you guys wanna try standing around this thing, kinda there, there, there, or there, something might happen. Or nothing might. I really can't tell for sure. At worst, I could try to manifest the possibility that we are all magic-attuned and see if we hear things."

Jason patted this stomach theatrically, "That giant transdimensional omelette sounds pretty good right about now. Wasn't there some promise of a free meal somewhere?"

"Oh, and by the way, remember how I said I didn't know anything about that magic stuff? Guess what? I wouldn't know anything about this negative energy stuff either. I'm not really that kind of guy." He glanced at the dagger blade still hanging in midair, "That's not really dark evil stuff like those necromajors.. uh... necromancipators... whatever those people are called, use. It's kinda a metaphysical instantiation of certain platonic truths. It's just the interaction of logical necessity with the contingent nature of our actualized world that makes it look like a shadow-void-thingy... I won't bore you guys with the details. Especially not this close to lunch."

Jason glanced hopefully around.

"Well, I don't know much, or anything, about this magic stuff, " Jason began, "but this thing is radiating in quite a few non-magical wavelengths as well, believe me."

Noticing the querying look on Corvus' face, he hastily added, "No, no... not like physical radiation, EM waves and microwaves and such. Not that I would know anyway, without special spectroscopes. What I mean is, this thing here is powerful enough to be warping the fabric of possibility in this room. It's some kind of node of destiny or something like that, and even nearby dimensions are being drawn around it. I mean.... look."

Jason raised a hand, and a sharp thin blade of shadow appeared floating above his palm. Except it wasn't quite a blade, nor was it quite a shadow, but some mind-twisting eye-wrenching approximation of both. "This," he explained, "is a manifestation of the logically necessary truth of non-contradiction. That is, something cannot be A and non-A at the same time. It holds across pretty much all possible worlds, or parallel universes as you might know them, meaning this blade should be virtually indestructible. I've used it to deflect the blast from Zeus titans even, and it's completely unscratched. But now..."

There was a tinge of fear in his voice. Before their eyes, the blade was losing cohesion, its edge becoming corroded, its essence wafting like smoke across the room in slow spirals towards the bowl in the middle.

"What this means is, that thing there is ...uh... important. Real important." He grinned wryly, "That's not really helpful, is it?"

The iris spun open silently, and a young man stumbled into the room, clearly not having expected it to open so quickly. He was attired in a black flak jacket over a tshirt and some cargos, but his spikey dark red hair and classic good looks made him look more like a pop star than a superhero.

Grinning sheepishly, he righted himself and gestured vaguely behind him, "Uh..Hi. So, this kid, Roger or something, told me to come here? Said something about free food? And that there was something really cool to look at.... and I'm guessing -that- would be it."

He looked at the frozen arcs of lightning, at the pillars and the spheres, then blinked a few times and looked around at those assembled, "I'm Jason by the way... I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"